Wearing the Pandemic: A Transcultural Expression Organizer: Etin Anwar, Professor of Religious Studies
The exhibit will display work that construes the pandemic experiences and discourses into artistic expression especially within the contexts of the Indonesian Muslim cultures. The exhibit offers an adaptation to disruption brought forth by pandemic through visual representation as seen in batik designs, paintings, and wearable items.
Mermaids and Empires
Organizer: Lisa Yoshikawa, Associate Professor of History and Asian Studies
In 1842, P. T. Barnum, a showman and a self-proclaimed “Prince of Humbug,” opened an exhibit in the Concert Hall at Broadway in New York City: The Feejee Mermaid. Come and learn about the origin of these mermaids, and how they symbolized empire-building in the last two centuries that led to the death of the mermaids, and the extinction and endangerment of their models, the sea cows and the giant salamanders. This whirlwind journey that starts in Gotham will take you through London, Batavia, Cape Town, Japan, Europe, the West Indies, the Philippines, Russian Far East, back to Japan, then to Taiwan and World War II Palau.
Top Image: “A Full Circle,” designed by Etin Anwar and made by Pandansari
Bottom Image: From an advertisement for the 1842 P.T. Barnum “The Feejee Mermaid” exhibition in New York City